If you live in a neighborhood with an HOA, chances are your dream of a wild, whimsical, nature-inspired garden might be up against some… let’s call them enthusiastically tidy landscaping rules. You’re not alone—plenty of nature lovers have run into the same wall.
But here’s the good news: you’re not the first to tackle this. A growing number of folks in the natural gardening movement have paved the way, creating helpful resources to make working with HOAs a lot less intimidating and a lot more productive. So don’t worry—you can grow a garden that makes both butterflies and your HOA smile.
North American Butterfly Association
8 Tips to Working with HOAs — Defending Your Garden Borders
You’ve caught the bug for “bugs” – and birds and native plants – and are now fully immersed in gardening for wildlife. The bees and butterflies have responded, flying in from points unknown to all their favorite flowers. The birds are flocking to your garden too, pecking at the leaves for insects and snacking on the seedheads. Dragonflies zip about snapping up mosquitoes, and squirrels bury their acorns all over the yard.
But there’s a different kind of animal who isn’t as enamored of your efforts to create a sanctuary for butterflies and other wildlife: the humans so obsessed with lawns that they will stop at nothing to impose them on the entire neighborhood.
National Wildlife Federation
Greening Your Homeowners Association
Fifteen years ago, when Janet Crouch planted a pollinator garden in her Columbia, Maryland, front yard, she had no idea she’d have to fight her homeowners association (HOA) in order to keep it. Today, her coneflowers, goldenrods, butterfly weeds and black-eyed Susans are finally safe from threats of obliteration by her HOA—and thanks to Crouch’s efforts, other state residents living in HOA-governed communities can feel free to nurture wildlife habitat on their property as well.
National Wildlife Federation
Guide to Passing Wildlife-Friendly Property Maintenance Ordinances
This guide is for mayors, heads of local and tribal governments, municipal staff, homeowners’ associations, and others who want to promote the expansion of wildlife- friendly habitats in their communities. It provides case studies of cities that revised their property maintenance ordinances to incentivize homeowners and other landowners to transform their land into wildlife habitats.
Garden For Wildlife
Why HOAs Should Encourage Wildlife Gardening in Neighborhoods
Nationwide, millions of people live in communities governed by HOAs. Traditionally—and still the norm today—such communities enforce conventional landscape aesthetics, namely turf grass and other nonnative plants that do not support biodiversity and require chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
